


The heat is on

by orphan_account



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Future Fic, M/M, Well-intentioned teenaged witch, as well as her long-suffering aunt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-12
Updated: 2012-11-12
Packaged: 2017-11-18 12:59:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/561310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Heat.</p><p>Heat is <i>everywhere</i>.</p><p>It is inescapable.</p><p> </p><p>(No, this is not a heat fic. I wouldn't even know where to begin with writing one of those. This is fluff. Fluff and wish-fulfillment.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The heat is on

**Author's Note:**

> I'm hormonal right now, and when I'm hormonal, my average temp of 97.2 degrees Fahrenheit rises to about 99, and _I can't handle it_ , ergo I decided to make Stiles suffer - and then for Derek to make it all better, because I wish someone would do that for me. 
> 
> The title comes from Glenn Frey's song of the same name.

Heat.

Heat is _everywhere_.

It is inescapable.

It radiates from his own body, from the sweat-slick sheets he kicked down toward his feet an age ago, from the slumbering wall laying mere inches away. Panting with the intensity of it, he tries to roll away from the slight dip he has hollowed out in the mattress, seeking a patch even slightly cooler than the rest.

He manages to roll onto his side, finding a sharp moment of relief, only to hear a plaintive noise and the sound of rustling fabric. The furnace that insinuates itself between Stiles and the faint stirring of the air conditioning along his bare back is normally as welcome as chocolate or breakfast in bed, but right now this is simply more than he can handle.

Sighing heavily, he drags himself out of bed and tries to tread lightly as he makes his way downstairs. Over the years, they have collected a wide array of ice packs for the many and varied injuries Stiles and the other human members of the pack have incurred in the midst of a crisis - or falling down the stairs, into doors, cabinets, and other malicious household items, as Stiles is wont to do, much to his and everyone else’s chagrin. Right now, though, he feels a swell of gratitude for his lack of coordination, because it provides him with quite the cornucopia of choices for his relief from this sweltering night.

As he rifles through the assorted ice packs that take up about half of the freezer, he allows himself to revel in the steady stream of frigid air that greets most of his front. He’s always known that having a refrigerator with a floor length freezer would come in handy at some point. He spots a small blue rectangle that fits in the palm of his hand, and he plucks it out, letting the freezer door close and making his way toward the roll of paper towels. After wrapping the ice pack loosely, he slaps it against his overheated neck and kind of wants to write a song about exactly how wonderful it feels.

It takes precious little time for his neck and the air outside of the freezer to render the ice pack useless, and he groans, getting up from the kitchen chair he had slumped into. While he switches out his little blue friend for a fresh pack, this one slightly bigger and a shock of white in the darkness of the kitchen at 2:00 am, Derek wanders in, hazily disgruntled. He mumbles “Again?” as he swipes a wide hand over his sleep-softened face and comes to sit with Stiles.

“Yeah,” Stiles sighs back. “We have _got_ to break that stupid spell. I don’t care how hard Lydia thinks it’s gonna be, I’m doing it anyway.” It is less than a week until Thanksgiving - the first Thanksgiving that the entire pack will be back in Beacon Hills since their high school graduation, which is something that Stiles doesn’t want to think too much on, because it just leaves him feeling a bit too old and frantic for his twenty-four years - and it feels like the fourth of July. In Texas.

“Normally I’d agree with you, but with this...” Derek’s hesitation is depressingly understandable. About three years ago, a young witch moved here with her aunt. For the most part Delia and her aunt Beam get along with the Hale pack. Actually, no. Delia practically is pack, and Beam is more than happy for her niece to have so many supernatural beings around to protect and relate to her, but every once in awhile, Delia messes something up in her training, and then the rest of them are left scrambling to figure out a way to fix it.

This latest fumble started because Delia wanted to help her aunt save money on indoor heating, as she guiltily informed Stiles once the damage was done, her wide blue eyes heartbroken and begging for forgiveness. (He gave it without hesitation, because Delia has become the little sister he’s never going to have, and because he’s always been a bit of a pushover when it comes to orphans who tend to get in way over their heads.) Unfortunately, she gave the spell far too much power, and trapped the entire county in a heatwave that has had the local meteorologists scratching their heads for the past two weeks.

All of this culminates in a headache for the entire pack, and especially for Stiles and Lydia, the resident magical experts outside of Delia and Beam, both of which have tried everything they can think of to reverse the spell. It’s different for Stiles and Lydia, though. Where Delia and Beam draw their strength from their blood, he and Lydia draw theirs from the preserve, which has held the magic of the Hale pack for the better part of the last two centuries. This makes things a bit harder for the two humans whenever they stray too far from Hale territory, but for the most part, they can perform magic that is beyond the grasp of natural-born witches, which makes solving this mess their problem.

It wouldn’t even _be_ a problem at all, if Deaton wasn’t on his honeymoon with the former Ms. Morell. With the four of them, they could have had this resolved the day it started. Still he can’t begrudge the two of them their time together. It took them far too long to get their feelings sorted out - which is ridiculous, considering the newly married Mrs. Deaton has been the guidance counselor at Beacon Hills High School for years, and should be more than capable of understanding her own emotions - for him to resent the month-long cruise they are taking in the Caribbean. And, okay, maybe Stiles wants this opportunity to show how far he and Lydia have come since they started studying in their junior year of high school. Is that so wrong?

“I don’t care,” Stiles declares, filling the silence that fell after Derek trailed off earlier. “I can’t sleep when it’s this hot, and if I don’t get a decent night’s sleep soon, there will be hell to pay.” Stiles may be the excitable one of the two of them, but he rarely feels angry. In the last few years, the same could be said of Derek, as well, though he is still quicker to lash out when members of the pack do or say something they shouldn’t. However, when Stiles goes too long without sleep, things get ugly, and nobody wants that. A few years ago, Isaac bought Stiles a mug for Christmas. It sounds innocent enough, until the words, “When mom isn’t happy, no one is,” register. Stiles had bopped Isaac on the nose with a spare roll of wrapping paper he’d hidden behind the couch for just such an occasion, but it’s become his favorite mug.

Derek eyes him intently, and Stiles lets him, more than accustomed to his mate’s intensity. “Come with me.”

Stiles wants to know, “Where, exactly?” before he agrees to anything, not because he mistrusts Derek, but because he is tired and cranky, and if this is going to land them in some kind of trouble, he’d like to prepare for it now, rather than later.

“We both know you’re not going to sleep anymore tonight, and you’re too tired to grade papers or look at lesson plans, and there’s no way I’m letting you work on the spell without Lydia, so we’re going to do something that has nothing to do with students, or magic, or anything stressful.”

As amazing as that sounds, Stiles can’t help but feel a little wary, still. “Yeah, okay, but _what is it_?”

Evidently tired of waiting, Derek raises an eyebrow at him before standing and slinging Stiles over his shoulder, slapping him on the butt for good measure. Stiles squawks, because he really thinks they should be beyond the caveman routine at this point, but to no avail. By the time they’re out the back door and heading into the woods, he is mulish and anxious, only managing to hold in the torrent of words which threaten to rain out of his mouth out of deference to the other supernatural creatures that inhabit the preserve. The faeries were understandably cross the night that Isaac and Scott got a little too loud right next to their faerie ring. Why the two of them couldn’t have kept their activities to their apartment is anybody’s guess, and Stiles seriously does not want to know. The point is, he and the rest of the pack have learned to show the other creatures some respect, and in return, they may see out each full moon unmolested.

Stiles settles in to enjoy the view of his mate’s posterior, which is every bit as enjoyable from upside down, and so he is understandably surprised when he finds himself sailing through the air, only to land in the lake. Sputtering, he surfaces and glowers at Derek. “Really-?” is all that he can get out before he sees Derek stripping off his boxer briefs and diving in au natural. His brain shorts out the way it always does at the reminder that all of that muscle and sinew is _his_ ; his to touch; his to love; his to protect. It will never matter how many years they spend together; he will always feel the gift and the onus of it deep in his blood and bones.

Derek comes up directly in front of Stiles and grins, though his mirth softens and becomes something sweeter when he takes in the look on his mate’s face. Raising one hand out of the water, he runs it down the side of Stiles’s temple to cup his cheek. “Better?”

“Actually - yeah. Yeah, it is.” Now that he’s moved past the indignity of the whole thing - and really, he teaches high school sophomores world history; he should be way over that by now - he can feel the soothing coolness of the lake water.

If this were happening back when they first started, when he was nineteen and decided that going away to college wasn’t all it was cracked up to be, and he came home and transferred to a college he could attend online, Derek would be radiating smugness right now, puffed up at the ability to give Stiles what he needs. He’s definitely still happy about the whole thing, but he’s secure enough in the two of them that he doesn’t feel any need for posturing, and it leaves Stiles replete with contentment, pushing away the exhaustion and frustration for a while.

“We’ll figure this out,” Derek tells him, and Stiles nods.

“Absolutely.” Looking between the two of them, he feels a spark of mischief and does nothing to quell it, grinning as he swims a few feet away. He reaches into the water and says, “But first, you have something to catch,” and slings his sopping boxers into Derek’s comically shocked face.

Stiles makes the most of his head start, but it’s what follows after he is caught that is the true prize. He has a feeling Derek would agree.


End file.
